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IAAF.org: Shaheen - a new life, old dreams

He wants to give Kenenisa Bekele a hard time

2004-02-16

Saif Saaeed Shaheen or Stephen Cherono, what name do I have to use? The answer
came immediately, “In Kenya I am Stephen Cherono.” A lot has
changed in the life of the 21 years-old Kenyan born Qatari in the last six
months, but one thing remains, he still has a lot of dreams, probably more than
ever.

The first one this year is that he wants to give Kenenisa Bekele a hard time
when it comes to the short course race at the World Championships in
Brussels.

In the next two months we will see you in some cross-country races: First
the 12 km at the Kenyan national championships in Nairobi and then the short
cross at the World Cross Country in Brussels. Why did you decide to go for
cross-country and not for indoors?

“I would have preferred to run the World Indoors but the federation
told me to run the cross-country. They want to enter a strong team, it will be
a good one. At the World indoors I would have been the only athlete from
Qatar.”